Can You Say It in 30 Seconds? Short-Form Video and the Limits of Promotional Compliance

By Rebecca Zadaka

Short-form video has become an increasingly important marketing tool for companies across the life sciences industry. Platforms built around brief, highly visual content allow companies to reach consumers and healthcare professionals quickly, often through videos measured in seconds rather than minutes. But for FDA-regulated products, including prescription drugs and medical devices, the features that make short-form video effective can also make promotional compliance more difficult. A format designed to simplify a message may leave little room for the qualifications, limitations, and other information necessary to ensure that the overall communication is truthful, compliant, and non-misleading.

FDA Requirements for Short-Form Video: The Format May Be Abbreviated, But the Compliance Obligations Are Not

FDA's existing regulatory framework does not provide a short-form content exception. Drug and device advertising   remain subject to requirements governing the presentation of information about a product's effectiveness and risks, including requirements that promotional communications not be false or misleading and present a fair balance between effectiveness and risk information. In determining whether  advertising is misleading, FDA considers not only what is stated, but also what is omitted and the manner in which information is presented. 

These issues can become particularly challenging in a 15- or 30-second video featuring product demonstrations, before-and-after imagery, spokesperson endorsements, patient or physician testimonials, animated graphics, or prominent performance claims. For both drugs and devices, an individual statement may be technically accurate even as the combination of claims, visuals, and context creates an overall impression that is misleading, suggests a use inconsistent with the product’s FDA-required labeling, or overstates what the product's FDA-authorized labeling or supporting evidence establishes. This may include communications that suggest different or broader indications, patient populations, uses, clinical benefits, or performance characteristics than those supported by the product's labeling and substantiating data. The limitations of a communication format do not eliminate the need to consider how product information is presented.

Risk Information and Disclosures Cannot Be an Afterthought 

Short-form video can make it particularly difficult to communicate the information necessary to put a product claim in proper context. This includes the presentation of relevant risk information, limitations of use, contraindications, warnings, precautions, or other information necessary to avoid creating a misleading impression about the product or its use. Simply including qualifying information somewhere in a video may not resolve the issue if viewers are unlikely to notice, read, or understand it in the context of the overall presentation. The prominence, placement, duration, and relationship of qualifying information to the claims it addresses can all affect how the communication is understood. A disclaimer or qualification also may not cure a misleading impression created by an otherwise unsupported claim. For example, FDA has expressly found that a “treatment results may vary” disclaimer did not mitigate the misleading impression created by a patient testimonial video’s claims of extraordinary results that were unsupported by data. 

“A disclaimer is not a magic eraser. If a video has already created a misleading impression through its claims, visuals, or presentation, simply adding a brief qualification may not be enough to correct the message.” 

Rebecca Zadaka, Associate Attorney

Key Takeaway: Be Mindful of Short-Form Video Compliance

The constraints of short-form video do not reduce the need for promotional compliance. As drug and device companies increasingly use TikTok, Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts, and other short-form formats, their review processes should account for the unique ways these platforms can affect the presentation and perception of product claims. When the information necessary to communicate a product's benefits, limitations of use, risks, or other material information accurately cannot fit into 30 seconds, the answer may not be to shrink the disclosure or speak faster. It may be to reconsider whether 30 seconds is enough.

How Gardner Law Can Help

Gardner Law helps  FDA-regulated companies evaluate promotional communications across traditional and emerging channels, including short-form video and social media. We can help companies review product claims, supporting evidence, risk information, disclosures, testimonials, visuals, and other elements of a communication to assess whether the overall presentation is truthful, adequately supported, and consistent with applicable FDA requirements.

We also work with legal, regulatory, and marketing teams to develop practical promotional review processes that account for the constraints of platforms such as TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts. When a message cannot be communicated accurately and compliantly within the limits of a particular format, we can help determine whether the claims, presentation, or format itself should change.

If your company is developing or reviewing short-form promotional content for an FDA-regulated product, contact Gardner Law to discuss how the applicable promotional requirements may affect your campaign.